October Webinar

ZEPHYR TEACHOUT TO SPEAK ON BREAKING UP MONOPOLIES

Zephyr Teachout, Fordham Law School professor and political activist, will speak Thursday October 15 at 7PM on her new book, Break ‘Em Up. Polly Cleveland will moderate. (See her review.) Teachout will explain how corporate monopolists increasingly victimize us and how we can fight back both by enforcing existing anti-trust and regulatory law, and designing new laws to rein in tech giants like Amazon, Google and Facebook.

Georgists will recognize that corporate monopolies ultimately depend on monopoly of land, in the sense of the government-protected “right” to conduct certain activities in a specified territory, often with a government license. For example, Big Pharma relies on patents to exclude competitors and suppress research. A domain name, like amazon.com, may seem global, but in fact it depends on Amazon’s ability to delivery the goods within a country, and on customers’ ability to reach its website through local wires and wireless. If corporations had to pay for their “rights”, many of their monopoly activities would become unprofitable. For example, Big Pharma couldn’t squat on valuable drug patents.

You can send your questions in advance to Polly Cleveland (mcleveland20@gmail.com) or to Sue Walton at sns@swwalton.com.

Please sign up: